Here are two videos of comedy duo Kumamushi (クマムシ) doing their comedy routine “Attakaindakara” (あったかいんだから/’Cause It’s Warm), in which one man imagines being reborn as a girl and becoming an idol while his partner insults him:

Here’s the official music video of “Attakaindakara” after it was released as an actual song:

Momoiro Clover Z’s (ももいろクローバーZ) newest single, “Yume no Ukiyo ni Saite Mina” (夢の浮世に咲いてみな/Try Blooming in the Floating World of Dreams), is their long-awaited collaboration with the heavily made-up American superstar band, KISS. The members of KISS wrote and performed the music for the song, and also provide backup vocals.

The single comes in two types: Momoclo version (ももクロ盤/Momokuro-ban) and KISS version (KISS盤/KISS-ban). The Momoclo version comes with a Blu-ray video of the music video; the KISS version has no video but has one extra song. That extra song is “Samurai Son.” “Samurai Son” has the same music as “Yume no Ukiyo ni Saite Mina,” but has English-language lyrics sung by KISS, with Momoiro Clover Z singing back-up. The lyrics to “Samurai Son” are a little different from “Yume no Ukiyo ni Saite Mina”‘s (see my English translation here)…but I suppose a certain amount of disparity to be expected when you have a collaboration between Japanese women in their 20’s and American men in their 60’s.

After my last quiz (about train stations), I decided to make another quiz that was more in line with my otaku type. So here are three quizzes about color-coded idols. I split them up by group so that everyone can play.

The lyrics, like the music video, are very strongly influenced by Japanese history and culture, making them really hard to carry over into English. So I have added annotations (links) to my translation of the lyrics. Click through to get more information.

Without further ado, here’s my translation of “Chururi Chururira!”(more…)